Chapter 20: The Neighbor
Joe's apartment building was a six-story walkup in a neighborhood that couldn't decide if it was gentrifying or decaying.
I'd mapped it during earlier surveillance but never spent extended time in the area. Tonight, I wanted a fuller picture. Joe's life beyond Beck and Mooney's. The edges of his world that might reveal something useful.
The coffee shop across the street had a window seat with a clear sightline. I ordered a large black coffee and settled in as darkness fell.
The building's residents came and went in the expected patterns. A woman with grocery bags. A couple arguing about dinner plans. An elderly man walking a small dog that took forever to navigate the steps.
At seven-fifteen, movement on one of the fire escapes caught my attention.
A boy—maybe ten or eleven—climbed through a window and sat on the metal grating. He had a book in one hand and headphones looped around his neck. Even from across the street, I could see the tension in his shoulders. The deliberate stillness of someone escaping something.
Joe emerged from the building a few minutes later. He noticed the boy, waved, said something that made the kid offer a small smile. Brief exchange—friendly, casual—before Joe walked toward the subway.
I filed the interaction. Joe has neighborhood connections. Friendly with local child.
The coffee went cold while I watched. The boy stayed on the fire escape, reading by the light spilling from the window behind him. An hour passed. Two.
Then the screaming started.
It came from inside the building—a woman's voice, high and frightened. A man's voice, louder, enraged. The words weren't clear, but the tone was unmistakable.
The boy on the fire escape didn't move. Just put his headphones on and stared at his book like he could disappear into the pages.
He's done this before.
Through lit windows, I caught glimpses of the argument. A man—big, aggressive, arms waving—and a woman trying to make herself small. The choreography of domestic violence, performed for an audience of one child who'd learned not to watch.
My Detection flared when I focused on the man. Genuine violence radiated from him—casual cruelty, the confidence of someone who'd never faced consequences. Not cold like Joe. Hot. Immediate. Dangerous in the mundane way that killed women every day.
The argument ended abruptly. A door slammed. The woman disappeared from the window. The man sat down, apparently satisfied with whatever he'd accomplished.
The boy stayed on the fire escape for another hour before climbing back inside.
I returned the next night. And the night after.
The pattern became clear. Ron—I got the name from the mailboxes during a carefully timed building entry—was the man. Claudia was the woman. Paco was the boy.
Ron worked something irregular—gone during days sometimes, home others. When he was home, the apartment was quieter. Claudia moved like she was navigating a minefield. Paco spent hours on the fire escape or in the building's small courtyard, anywhere that wasn't inside.
Joe watched them. I watched Joe watch them.
His window had a perfect angle on the fire escape. When Paco was outside, Joe often appeared at his window, book in hand, pretending to read while keeping the boy in view. The Detection showed something complicated in Joe—protectiveness mixed with darker calculations. He saw a child in danger and a monster causing it.
He saw a role to play.
Hero. Savior. The good version of the violence Ron represented.
I'd seen this before, in the pattern I was building. Joe attached to vulnerable people, positioned himself as their defender, then eliminated threats to their safety. Benji had threatened Beck's perfect-girlfriend potential. Ron threatened Paco's childhood.
Different justifications, same outcome. Bodies that Joe felt righteous about creating.
If Joe killed Ron, I'd weaken. The cosmic rules were clear—every death Joe caused drained my power. It didn't matter that Ron was an abuser. It didn't matter that the world might be better without him.
Joe killing anyone damaged me. Which meant I had to stop Ron before Joe did.
I sat on a bench across the street, watching the lit windows of what passed for Paco's home.
The helplessness was crushing. I couldn't stop domestic violence by existing near it. Calling the police might make things worse—Claudia could refuse to cooperate, Ron could escalate, Paco could end up in the system. The "right" answer wasn't obvious.
The only clear action was finding a way to remove Ron that didn't involve Joe's intervention.
Ron probably had a record. Men like him usually did. Assault charges, restraining orders, outstanding warrants from places they'd fled. Skeletons waiting to be found.
I added it to my list. Research Ron's background. Find leverage. Remove him legally before Joe removed him permanently.
The list was getting long. Candace Stone. Ron Lexy. Peach's investigation. Beck's safety. Joe's escalating patterns.
One person, trying to hold back a tide.
I bought a hot dog from a cart vendor, ate it without tasting it, and walked home through streets that were starting to feel less foreign.
The city was becoming familiar. That probably meant I was staying too long in one place.
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